Tap
by xXRubyDiamondXx
Summary: Max was scared. It wasn't as rare of an occurence as she made her flock think. But she had to make herself look strong. She always hid how afraid she was, how weak she thought she really was, but was never able to hide it from one person. Fang. Small Fax.


**Tap**

Max was scared. It really wasn't as rare of an occurrence as she made her Flock think. But, she had to make herself look strong. She was the oldest and they had always looked up to her at the School. She hid how afraid she was, how weak she really thought she was, but was never able to hide it from one person. Fang. But then again, he couldn't pull his stoic act with her, either. But she couldn't tell him about this. She couldn't tell anyone. A thunderstorm was not something she could cry about to someone,_ especially_ Fang. She couldn't help but think that he would want to laugh at her, even if he did hide it for her sake.

Thunder rolled across the sky in a predatory manner. She took in a shaky breath, wondering when she had begun to hold her breath. Rain poured down. She didn't mind rain. She didn't necessarily _mind_ storms either. They just scared her, which was one of the reasons she liked them so much. They were exactly like herself, and what went through her mind when she didn't have Nudge raving about her Barbie or Cinderella, when she didn't have to take notes in her mind about how to handle Iggy and Gazzy blowing up something by watching Jeb intently, when she didn't have to change Angel's diaper, when she didn't have to worry about hiding her blushes when Fang looked at her and smiled when no one else was looking, things were scary.

A particularly bright lightning flash pierced her window with its light and-

"_There's no need to cry, Max," Ari told her, looking worried because of her tears. He was about five, now. His birthday would be soon. Ari made Max's birthday the same day as his, even though she didn't understand what that truly meant. She would never tell anyone what she didn't know, though. Lights came and went across the ceiling that she was forced to stare at due to being wheeled through one of the many hallways in the School on a hospital bed that smelled of blood. "You'll be okay, Max. Right, Dr. Collin?" _

_He smiled sadistically and said in a sickeningly sweet voice, "Of course." The doctor pulled her into a surgical looking room and hooked her up to heart monitors._

_Then, he picked up a large, metal rod. He flipped a switch on it and blue sparks came to life on the tip of it, and it came lower and lower, towards her bare flesh, and then-_

Lightning flashed again, and it took her a moment to realize that that had happened last year. Then a small smile came to her face. Even with their raptor vision, none of the Flock would have seen it because it was so small, but it was a smile nonetheless. She triumphed silently in her accomplishment. Just yesterday, she had mastered what Jeb had been trying to teach her for a week. A week. That meant 7 days. Days were when it was light outside, night was the dark. A year was 365 days. She had yet to master what a month was. But how stupid! Why separate parts of a year? And if months have names or whatever, shouldn't years have them too?

It didn't make sense in her uneducated mind.

She slowly got up and eased her way out of the room and down the hallway. She jumped when she heard the windows rattle as thunder rolled across the sky. Maybe it was the thunder, since it happened at the same time, but maybe it wasn't. She gulped, very near tears. Jeb's room was right down the hallway. She could always go get him, but that would mean that she would have to pass the windows to get there. She sniffled and, feeling like she had no other choice, ran into the kitchen. She passed the dark living room, sure that something was behind her. She flipped on the switch, twirled around with the grace of a suma wrestler, and all was eerily quiet. She just knew that something was watching her. But nothing was there. Her heart was racing. Her ears were pounding. But nothing was there. The windows rattled again, but quietly. The rain seemed to fall gently, now. The lightning was suddenly less frightening than it had been before.

"I knew you were scared," Fang said. That wasn't scary to her. Fang never scared her, never on purpose, and if he did it was a playful act, and he knew when she had had enough.

"I'm not scared." She wiped a small drop of moisture that she refused to call a tear, and turned around to find Fang right in front of her. "I just don't like it."

Fang's face stayed the same, like it always did. Not a frown, not a smile, just stoic. But, at the same time, everything was suddenly different. He was telling her that he knew, he knew she was scared, he knew that she knew that he knew that she was scared **{Just read that part again. It does make sense, after a while. } ** , but he didn't say it. He didn't have to. She knew and he knew. That was the norm for them.

"You- you're scared too," she said wearily.

"No, I just don't like it." He voice was strong, but somewhere deep inside that stoic expression that only she knew was an act, she could see that wasn't the truth. She was the only one who could see deep inside him, where no one else could. It was amazing at how clear his plain expression was when she could see it up close, and not through the bars of a dog cage in the dark of the prison where the cages of innocent children were held. But she knew. She knew how he would wait until everyone around was asleep and he would cry. He would look at her through the bars with his head leaning up against the side staring at her, telling her how much it hurt, silently screaming- the loudest of all of them- for help. But they didn't have to do that anymore. Because they were safe, but the memories were enough, the pain was enough, to make them feel like they were dying, and in a way they were. The scars were enough to kill them. Fang couldn't handle people seeing his weaknesses, because he was afraid that everyone would use them against him, because the first ten years of his life, that was exactly what had happened.

Now, the most emotionally ill one of whole lot was silent, never telling anyone what was wrong. Not anyone. Except her. Not always her, not every time, but if anytime, her.

"What're you doing here?" she asked in a small voice, looking down, not wanting to see his pain, not wanting him to see her's.

"Water," he responded. They both knew he was lying, but no one acknowledged it. The two glances at Jeb's door, the tears that made his black eyes look shiny, his breath, normally calm enough to not be heard at all, which was now uneven and heard- that was enough. No one else would have seen it, no one else would have noticed, but Max wasn't just anyone else. Not to Fang, at least.

"Me, too," she responded, but they both knew she wasn't talking about the water, but Jeb.

He nodded vigorously. "Right. Um… night." He brushed past her shakily and she smelled sweat, the normal smell of the boys, as they didn't get the refreshing feeling from being able to take a bath every night instead of every year, when the Whitecoats said they could. And really, a bath to the Whitecoats was basically throwing them all in a giant pool with their whole room full of experiments, seeing who would learn to swim first, who would figure out what soap was first, that sort of thing.

It was actually a very terrifying experience, especially for the girls due to their small frames, because everyone tried to grab onto everyone- not a very good idea considering everyone was drowning, but, what else could they do? The walls were electrical.

She got the water that she didn't want, drank it, ran back to her room, wondering why she hadn't gone to Jeb's, wondering why if she wasn't going to him, she hadn't just walked back with Fang. Their rooms were right next to each other's after all. She entered her room reluctantly, not really sure what she wanted to do. The storm was still raging. It knew exactly what it wanted to do, even when she didn't- another reason she hated it; another reason she liked it.

She climbed into her bed, under the warm blankets, liking how the cloth somehow made her safe, when she heard it.

_Tap! Tap! _

It was odd, completely abnormal, but then she remembered. Jeb was helping them make up a sign language the other day for themselves. The tapping meant anything really, mainly for Iggy's use because he was blind. It could mean: You're turn, let's go, get up, sit down, etc…

But somehow that one didn't mean anything to her; but somehow it meant everything.

Fang. Fang was tapping the wall next to her bed, where his bed was. She put her hand on the wall, her hyper senses feeling the body heat through it. She placed her hand straight across from his.

_Tap! Tap! _

He had done it again. She did it back. And they both felt safe. Why? They'll never know, but to some it would be obvious.

During experiments, they were always apart. In their cages they were apart. In their emotions, they were completely different. In the way they mourned, they were different, apart. But just like at the School, during experiments, during tears, just like how they were different and apart, they were right next to each other. When they looked across the small space in between the cages, they both cried to each other, silently telling each other what was wrong, never saying a thing.

Tonight was just like that. After the tears, there was always a rainbow. Tonight no one saw the rainbow, though. There was no sun, there was no glow off the mountainside, because the tears and the rain stopped before the night was over, but neither of them knew that either, because, even though apart, together, they fell asleep.

Tomorrow they woke up to find that their hands had fallen to the side, their eyes had closed to rest. But at different times that morning, they heard something that for the two of them, and the two of them only, meant something a whole lot more than everyone else thought.

_Tap! Tap!_

**Soooo…? You like? Review .**


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